Kenyan forces storm under-siege mall, hunt for terrorists

Kenyan forces storm under-siege mall

The terror siege on a shopping mall in an upscale neighbourhood in Nairobi, Kenya entered its fourth day today.

Three Indians were among the 62 people killed when 10 to 15 terrorists attacked the Westgate Shopping Mall on Saturday.

The third Indian has been identified as Sudharshan B Nagaraj from Bangalore, the spokesperson in the ministry of external affairs said on Tuesday.

Earlier, two Indians, including an 8-year-old boy, were declared dead in the attack.

They were identified as 40-year-old Sridhar Natarajan, employee of a pharmaceutical firm, and Paramshu Jain, son of a manager of the local Bank of Baroda branch.

However, some media reports claimed that as many as nine Indians may have been killed in the attack.

This is the deadliest assault since Al Qaeda bombed the US embassy in Nairobi in 1998, leaving over 200 people dead.

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Image: Smoke rises from the Westgate shopping centre in Nairobi following a string of explosions during the third day of a stand-off between Kenyan security forces and gunmen inside the buildingPhotographs: Johnson Mugo/Reuters

Kenyan forces storm under-siege mall

The terrorists belong to Al-Shabaab, a Somali Islamic terror group affiliated with the Al Qaeda.

Al-Shabaab had taken responsibility for the attack and even mentioned the names of nine of the terrorists on its Twitter handle.

The Twitter account has since been suspended.

Al-Shabaab has claimed that some of the terrorists belonged to the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Canada.

The attack is a major setback for both the Kenyan government and the United States administration, which had claimed that the crackdown on Islamic terrorists in Kenya, backed by US forces, had been a success.